Everyone with a bad boss or an awful co-worker thinks they have a hostile work environment.  But legally speaking a “hostile work environment” is a very specific type of harassment and it is pretty tough to prove weak hostile work environment claims in court.

If your boss yells at you each morning, you may not have a hostile work environment although it might feel that way to you.  However, if your boss yells at you using slurs, profanity and it happens every day at nearly every interaction, then you may have a hostile work environment. Unlawful hostile work environment can occur on account of race, gender, national origin, religion, age, appearance,  disability or in some jurisdictions, sexual orientation discrimination.

If a co-worker makes a false complaint about you to HR one time and it is found to be a result of their jealousy of your recent merit award, that might stink to have to deal with but probably wouldn’t rise to the condition of a hostile work environment.  However, if a co-worker makes repeated false complaints about you weekly to HR in an effort to get you fired because you are of a different religion, then you may have a hostile work environment.

In order to satisfy the legal requirements, your work atmosphere must meet two prongs of criteria:

A.        If you want to keep your job, you have to endure the offensive conduct; and,

B.        The offensive conduct is so severe or pervasive that any reasonable person would consider it intimidating, hostile or abusive.

Prong A is pretty cut and dry.  If you were to tell the harasser to stop and then you experience some adverse employment action such as an unwarranted negative performance review, demotion or even termination, you satisfied Prong A.

Prong B is a little more subjective.  What is a reasonable person?  How can you estimate what a reasonable person might think about your situation?  Just how intimidating, hostile or abusive does your harasser have to be for a reasonable person to agree with you?  How can such a personal experience be quantified for comparison to a hypothetical “reasonable person?”

You can find more information at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission website.

That’s where we can help.  Henrichsen Siegel has a long track record of assisting our clients navigate the reporting of and, if necessary, the prosecution of employers that permit hostile work environments. Contact us today to resolve this matter and ease your mind.  We represent clients in Washington, DC, Maryland, Virginia, Florida and Georgia.

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Posted in Harassment